Stolen Years
by Ringbearingreasergal
Summary: Legolas comes across a human child who calls herself Lucy Pevensie and before long, curious knowledge leads to tragedy. Oneshot. Slightly AU. LOTRxNarnia Crossover.


**Hello everyone, here's another Ring-Shot I came up with over Christmas break. I swear I wasn't even planning on writing anything having to do with LOTR, but I used my all purpose One-Shot Generator game and it threw the characters Lucy and Legolas together. I rather liked the idea. If you'd like more information about the One-Shot Generator, feel free to PM me.**

**AU Elements: There are faeries in Middle Earth because I want them there. Lucy is eleven years old and not nine. Legolas is roughly 2900 years old. Takes place about a year after the War of the Ring.**

**Stolen Years**

There comes a time in every man's life when he realizes he has a persistent, insatiable longing ... to be able to _purr_. And for Legolas Greenleaf, prince of Mirkwood, this time had come. It was early spring in the clearing over the outskirts of Rivendell between the light forests and the stream and everything was right in the world. The wood elf lay on his back, tunic dampening slowly and comfortably in the dew that sparkled off of the soft, light green grass. The sky was a hazy light blue with a wispy cumulous clod drifting conveniently in front of the bright, warm sun. The stream next to him laughed joyously as it rushed in the day over smooth stones.

Legolas stretched his arms, his chest arching with a comfortable satisfaction as he settled back on the ground, hands nestled under his head, fingers laced, elbows bent. Pale blue eyes that matched the sky closed and opened at their leisure—taking time to process the beautiful day and retreating into the luxury of being—safely—alone and not having to be on such awares all the time.

It was his first time in Rivendell in a little over a year and he had _missed it_. Of course the most prominent reason for his visit was to see Elrohir and Ellodan, but the two princes were on a hunting trip they'd been planning for quite some time now and although they had pleaded for Legolas to accompany them, the elf had to decline the offer. He had done enough killing in the last year to last him a lifetime and lately, he could swear he felt sick even picking up his long bow. Elrond, his father, and Elessar assured him that it was a simple result of overexposure to death they'd faced a year ago during the war of the Ring and that it would pass in time. Elrohir and Ellodan had their own special name for him: Pansy.

Well whatever it was, Legolas thought, letting sun warm him gently through the tree's leaves on one side and the gurgling of the brook fill his ears on the other, he was glad it got him out of working on a day like today. Legolas thought lazily that he could lie in the bright clearing for years without being interrup—

A twig snapped. "Oh dear, where am I?"

--ted.

Both the snapping of the twig and the small female voice came from his left, in the forest. It sounded quite close, but elf ears can ear very well from very far away and the only other noise was the white, flowing stream. Legolas remained unperturbed. It was a child's voice and at worst he'd have to explain how to get back to the city's main gates and remind her not to go wandering. He liked elf children. They were curious and pretty and always clean. Well, almost always clean. He remembered his own elfling days with great amusement. In the full 200 years he had been considered a child, he, Elrohir, and Ellodan had never run out of adventures to have.

Legolas heard heavy, awkward footsteps that didn't sound quite . . . Elven, and wondered how the child could have gotten so close without him hearing them before. They grew closer and Legolas vaguely dismissed the idea that it would be perhaps polite to sit up at least as the lady entered. Even a very, very, young lady.

"Oh my!" The young voice cried as it emerged from the forest. "Sir, are you awake?" What an odd question. Of course he was awake. At this, he opened his eyes and sat up.

"Yes I am—my apologies if I've frightened . . . you." Legolas's eyebrows shot up as he realized the child in front of him was—to the contrary of his previous daydreams—very much human. She was small, maybe little more than half his own height with the solid build of a developing child. She had a cherubic face with rose-red lips and large brown eyes that looked as if they belonged to a doe. Dark hair fell just beyond her shoulders in gentle waves and her ears were small and round. Lastly, her clothes were an odd, dark blue two-piece skirt and matching shirt. It was a style he'd seen only very few of the fashionably experimental lady-elves wear—and certainly not in this straight, colorless design. Certainly not on a human child. The dark-haired, doe-eyed, oddly-clothed human girl carried a bewildered expression.

"Excuse me, sir," her voice was thinly accented but her common-tongue was flawless, "but can you tell me where in Narnia I am?" She asked. Legolas glanced her up and down one last time. Her shoes were hard, flat and black and looked quite uncomfortable. Legolas had no idea what or where 'Narnia' was, but he knew that this girl had come from somewhere very far away.

"How did you get within the city limits?" He wondered aloud. "A human!" The small girl rolled her eyes.

"Yes, yes, I'm a Daughter-Of-Eve," she said with a wave of her hand. "And believe it or not, I was queen of this place once. Oh—that reminds me. Would you mind telling me the year as well?" She asked.

Legolas blinked. _Queen? Her? _Hardly! "This isn't . . . Nernaya or whatev—"

"_Narnia_," the girl finished for him. "It's not _Narnia_. Well then where is this? Telmar? Galma?" She looked around, observing the brook. "Looks like Galma," she remarked.

"Child," he said gently. "I've never heard of any of those places. This is _Rivendell_," he said. Her rose-red lips frowned.

"How _do_ you call me child? I told you, I'm a _queen_," she insisted, her voice holding a sudden regality. "And you tell me you've never even _heard_ of Narnia? A long time must've past," she muttered to herself. "And oh—bother. Not even Edmund around to help me." As strange as it sounded, Legolas decided to explore the theory that this young girl—perhaps a mere ten or eleven years old—_was_ the queen of this mysterious 'Narnia'. It could be one of the ancient Northern-Lands that lies far beyond the borders of any of the countries Legolas had traveled to. It could lie far to the west—beyond Gondor. She must've been kidnapped—maybe for her position, maybe her country was at war with another. But for her to have been placed somewhere like this, it must've been a long journey therefore she couldn't have just appeared. No. There must be some other explanation.

The year is 3020," Legolas responded. "Does your mother or father know you're here?" He asked. The girl shook his head.

"Well . . . no! They never know that I've even _been_ to anywhere besides Earth!" She said.

"So you say you live in . . . Earth, or Narnia?" Legolas presumed. The girl plopped down on the grass beside him.

"Oh-no—well, it's complicating," she said. "I live in Finchley. I did live in Narnia for the fifteen years we reigned, but then we accidentally came back . . ."her voice trailed off. "It's confusing." Legolas really didn't understand a word she just said. "Who are you, anyway?" She asked.

"I am Legolas Greenleaf Thraduilion," he said. "Prince of Mirkwood. Who might you be?" He asked, slightly indulgent. The girl laughed lightly.

"I am Lucy Pevensie," she answered. "Lucy the Valient—high queen in Narnia," she answered back with her own pride. "You're a prince—you may have heard of Caspian . . .?" He shook his head. "He's a prince too," she added. As if that would help. She sighed. "You really don't know very much at all do you?" Legolas struggled to keep from getting frustrated.

"I am twenty-nine_ hundred_ years old—I probably know a _little_ bit more about Middle-Earth than you, human." He said. "And I've never heard of this Narnia, therefore, I'm sure it's not a country _in_ Middle-Earth." The girl's face fell. Legolas immediately felt like the dirt of the Earth.

"Twenty-nine hundred _years_," she mumbled, before looking up at him. "You don't look like it," she said. Legolas laughed cheerfully.

"One of the small benefits of being an elf," he agreed. The girl furrowed her eyebrows.

"An elf? There are no elves in Narnia!" She exclaimed. "Come to think of it, there are no elves to the north or west of Narnia either!" She looked back at Legolas, a new light of inspiration in her large brown eyes. "This place is called Middle-Earth, you say? And has always been called Middle-Earth?" She asked. Legolas nodded before reaching out a long slender hand and brushing it against her forehead.

"Are you sick?" He wondered. She shook her head excitedly.

"This isn't Narnia at all! This is a completely new place! How exciting! Oh—that means that you truly have no idea who I am or what I'm talking about, do you?" She giggled delightedly and blushed. Legolas looked at her curiously and smiled at her.

"I'm afraid not," the elf admitted. The doe-eyed girl who called herself Lucy flicked her eyes about the beautiful golden scenery restlessly.

"I'm dreadfully sorry," she apologized. "I'm Lucy Pevensie and the thing is I—this brook leads to a waterfall, doesn't it?" She asked. When Legolas nodded, the girl sprang to her feet. "Wonderful!" She cried, her eyes sparkling. "I knew there was! I could promise I heard it! Now which direction is it in?" She asked. Legolas too, then, stood to his feet. Not necessarily because he felt obligated to.

"You're _not_ going out by yourself," the long-haired prince stated firmly. "Even in the outskirts of Rivendell, mischief can find its way about." The girl tilted her head, her large eyes full of a combination of wonder and curiosity.

"What kinds of mischief?" She asked. "Dwarves? Angry snakes? Faeries?" She inquired. Legolas was taken aback.

"The only dwarves you'll find here are friendly and snakes are not seen here. But it is true—the faeries in these parts are quite devious."

"Well then why don't _you_ come with me? If this is truly an entirely new world, there's a lot of exploring to be done, isn't there? We better get going!" Legolas looked down at her calm, shining, expectant face and a small half-smile found its way to Legolas's lips.

"Alright," he agreed. "I will go with you to the waterfall." The girl didn't thank him, but she did smile to herself, pleased, and focused her eyes on the path ahead of them. The stream curved to the right and they stepped lightly around the stream's edge.

"What brought you here, Lucy?" Legolas asked after a minute or two of a contented silence on Lucy's end. When she spoke, it was not the energetic tone he had expected.

"I suppose it was a very strong, very deep magic," she said, her voice strangely thoughtful and almost quiet. Legolas almost thought he misheard the statement. A human child knowing of deep magic?

"Where do you come from, Lucy?" He asked.

"It's complicated," she replied, her voice lighter as she skipped in front of him in the grass. "Haven't we decided this already?" She asked.

"But . . . you tell me this 'Finchley' is not _in_ Middle-Earth?" He asked.

She shook her head. "No—it isn't." Legolas raised an eyebrow.

"Then you are right. It must have been a strong magic that brought you here to Rivendell."

"You believe me then!" She exclaimed. And Legolas thought he heard relief in her voice.

"You seem quite educated and bright therefore you cannot be mad, and . . ." he chose his words carefully, looking at her as they moved. "I do not think you lie." He was rewarded with a beaming smile as they marched on.

"It used to be the four of us," she said," my eldest brother Peter, eldest sister Susan, Edmund, and I—the youngest. We discovered Narnia and its wonders in the back of a wardrobe quite some years ago. When we got back to Finchley, it was an entire year before we went back—many years had passed in Narnia since we'd been there. When we returned once more to Earth I thought for sure I'd be going back soon . . . but I'm here now in a strange place called Middle-Earth . . . I wonder if someone is fiddling with the magic. I wonder why it would be that they send me here . . . all alone . . ." she glanced at Legolas suspiciously. "You're not going to kidnap me, are you?" She asked.

"Certainly not!" The fair prince exclaimed. Lucy smiled at him easily.

"I thought not. But I did want to check. The first time I entered Narnia, my first friend, Tumnus, was really planning to take me to a terrible witch. When traveling into other worlds I've learned that you can never be too careful."

"You seem like an old soul," Legolas said, smiling a bit. "How old are you?"

"I'm . . . eleven," she answered softly. Legolas shook his head and knew there was more.

"Really?" He asked, noting for the first time that they were moving with relative speed and that she was having no problems keeping up. At that moment, though, she slowed—as did he—at her lead. She stopped and looked at him.

"I wasn't always eleven years old," she said, her voice unsure. "My brothers, Susan, and I reigned for fifteen _years_ in Narnia. We were respected kings and queens. We were skilled and we knew so much . . ."

"What happened?" Legolas asked, trying to understand the small clues of foreign enchantments this girl was giving him. Lucy was quiet a moment before speaking. We turned back," she said and her voice was strange. "We'd forgotten about the wardrobe and the lamp-post and we walked our way out the door. Back into Finchley. And it was like not a day had past. I was a child again." She looked at him. "Fifteen years," she said. Legolas understood the odd sense of loss this Lucy felt.

"Stolen," he said to himself as they reached the waterfall. The word did not go unnoticed by Lucy.

"What?" She asked as she began to climb the jagged rocks. "What did you say?"

"Those years you lived, it sounds as if they'd been cheated from you. They were stolen." Legolas noted that the rocks were not completely sturdy. "Be on you awares," he warned. "It's a long way down." Lucy grappled with the rocks before hoisting herself up, sitting behind the roaring echo of the cold white water.

"Do you hear that?" Lucy asked suddenly. Legolas tuned his ears. There was the faintest sound of twinkle shimimering. "I'd know that sound anywhere! There's a faerie or two around this cave. I wonder what their names are . . ." Legolas smiled.

"Do you make it a habit of conversing with faeries?" He asked, amused. Lucy looked up at him, startled.

"Well of course," she said, "do the animals and trees speak here too?" She asked.

"The tree creatures spoke to us when the land was young with me . . . but it was a very long time ago," he said with quiet regret. Behind them in the darkness of the cave, two tiny blue lights glowed in the black. A small faerie flitted in front of Legolas and Lucy. She was beautiful and naked and no bigger than Lucy's pointer finger. She had glowing cerulean butterfly wings and eyes the same depthless burning color. Her long midnight black hair tumbled like the waterfall itself across her shoulders and down her back. Her lips were tiny, deliberate, and crimson. She was the most beautiful thing Lucy had thought she'd ever seen.

"You're _beautiful_," Lucy breathed, reaching out a hand.

"Careful, Lucy," Legolas warned. "Their native location gives it a great power. She is a water faerie and this is her domain." The faerie opened her mouth and a tongue bathed in gentleness and purity rolled from her mouth like the quietest music. Legolas, being vaguely familiar with the tone faeries used, sensed a rare urgency in the creature's voice. When she finished speaking, she flitted through the waterfall and was gone.

"I wonder where she went," Lucy said, almost sadly. Legolas examined the black, cool cave ahead of them.

"I don't know," he admitted. "But it takes a great deal for any faerie to be convinced to leave her home. Especially in the presence of strangers. Perhaps it would be best if we—"

"—explored deeper to see what's wrong!" Lucy suggested. "Come on! It'll be an adventure!" And before Legolas could say otherwise, Lucy Pevensie pranced into the blackness.

"Lucy? Lucy, wait!" He called, carefully stepping in. "At least wait for me," he said. He felt a small hand take his own.

"I'm right here," she said, almost patronizingly, "don't worry about me. Come on!" They journeyed several more minutes into the cave and then there was no sign of danger, but there was no sign of light either. "I wonder if Aslan brought me here? . . ." she said to herself.

"Who is this 'Aslan'?" Legolas asked, curious about this other world. He heard the smile on her face brighten.

"Aslan is a lion," she said to herself dreamily, "a great, great lion. He is my very best friend, and he is very, _very_ old. Older than the oldest of you elves, you know. His power is limitless. He was the being that crowned us." Legolas knew not what to make of these words.

The faintest hint of a rumble grazed Legolas's ears. That was odd . . . he paused for a moment, and Lucy blindly stopped with him. The sound became a ring that became a distant roar.

"What is it, Legolas?" Lucy whispered, gripping his hand. Legolas's heart sank as he realized what the noise meant. The cave. Not all of it was stable . . .

"Lucy, get out of here," Legolas said quickly. "Get to the exit. Run." Thank the Valar the girl didn't have to be told twice. She dropped his hand, turned around, and ran.

The deep rumbling began. Legolas heard the sound esculate from behind him. He had mean to give Lucy the advantage of getting out first since he had reflexes that could dodge any stray rocks and the night-vision a falcon could envy. But now he saw that he may indeed have endangered her by telling her to leave him. But it was too late to think about that now. A black, jagged rock about the size of Legolas's head came crashing down, that Legolas dodged easily enough. He tumbled out of the way as the cave ceiling collapsed and rolled to his knees, ducking his head as a fist-sized stone smashed into the ground.

Legolas heard a shriek several yards away. Lucy.

He stumbled to his feet, running when he could, towards the cave's exit. It was right _at_ the entrance that he saw her. He gasped, stricken. A boulder at least her size had her pinned at her chest. She would die if he didn't do something soon. The rumbling faded as the last of the ceiling rocks settled and Legolas ran to the boulder, heaving it off of her and letting it tumble into the creek. Breathing hard, Legolas turned to look down at Lucy. Anguish touched his face.

Lucy's body was positively broken.

Her right hip was twisted horribly out of place and her entire torso had been crushed. Blood pooled out from underneath her. Legolas dared not move her, knowing that any movement at all could send her heart and lungs into a worse condition than they already were. Legolas spoke in a low voice.

"Lucy?" He asked. "Lucy?" When her eyes fluttered open, Legolas thought he would die of relief. "I'm going to get help Lucy. Stay awake." He had minor healing magic, but it would take Elrond to give her even a chance of surviving this. He stood up.

"No—Legolas—please, stay," she gasped. Don't leave me alone here." Legolas hesitated, torn.

"There's people who can heal you," he said. "If I hurry—"

"—you won't make it _back_ in time," she said, her voice breaking, a tear or two running out of those heart-breakingly large eyes. "Please," she whispered. Legolas took one last look at Rivendell. She was right. By the time he would get back to her, she'd be gone. He knelt by her.

"Little one, I won't leave. You're not alone." He could not leave her crying. "I'm here," he said, touching her broken hand.

"I don't understand. I survived so much," Lucy choked, tears running from her eyes. "Battles and wolves and drowning and witches—why this? Why here, alone? I was a queen once! Why would it be taken away? Aslan, why?" Her voice rang in pain and confusion. As the sun set, a wind lifted and blew Legolas's hair back and it seemed that a deep, golden whisper echoed through the wind.

_Once a king or queen in Narnia, __**always**__ a king or queen in Narnia_.

When Lucy heard this voice she began to sob. "Aslan if you can hear me then _take_ me!" She pleaded. "You've shown me so much—_please_ take me back! There's so much I want to learn and do for Narnia. Aslan I'm _eleven-years-old!"_ She screamed to the wind.

It did not answer.

Night fell on the outskirts of Rivendell and gold fell to gray and as Lucy slowly died, Legolas felt the fear for her lost life meld into acceptance for the one who controlled the magic that destined Lucy to die here. He had no idea who Aslan was or what role he played in Lucy's life, but his heart broke when he saw the love and pain in Lucy's eyes when she spoke his name.

Within the hour, Lucy was ready to die. She looked up at Legolas painstakingly and her breath coming quicker, she spoke.

"My name is Lucy Pevensie," she said. "I am the youngest sister of four. I am a royal queen in a foreign land called Narnia. I am a warrior, and a healer. I am a friend to men, trees, beasts, fauns, dwarves, and elves." Legolas smiled for her. "I assisted with the defeat of the terrible White Witch and if anyone else from Narnia stumbles upon you, let it be known Prince Legolas that Queen Lucy The Valient died declaring this: long live Aslan and long live the Kings and Queens of _Narnia_."

With that final breath the dark-haired, doe-eyed, eleven-year-old Queen was gone.

Legolas slowly let go of her hand and surveyed the sight. "Stolen." He said. "The years were stolen from her."

Legolas bowed his head and looked away.

**XxXxXx**

**Review, if you like.**


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